Historical Context: NC State Tournament Factoids

With today’s first NCAA tournament appearance in 5 years coming up at 12:40PM today, I wanted to take a quick look back on NC State’s appearances in the NCAA tournament through the years for some useless factoids.

Since the 1950’s when the NCAA tournament expanded to 16 teams (it has been only 8 conference champions prior to that) and after the creation of the ACC, NC State has been to the NCAA tournament 19 times.

Of NC State’s 19 appearances, it has been knocked out of the first roundÂ 5 times (1955 field of 22, 1982 field of 48, 1987 field of 64, 1988 field of 64, 2002, field of 65… all fields include play-in games).

NC State has never been worse than an 11 seed.

During NC State’s 5 first-round loses, they were seeded 7, 11, 3, and 9 (there were no seeds during the 1955 game).

The only other coaches in NC State history to go to the NCAA tournament in their first year was Les Robinson and Press Maravich.Â Everett Case, Herb Sendek, and Sidney Lowe went to the NIT their first year (though with expansion, some could argue that Everett may have made an “expanded” NCAA field though Everett Case’s NIT team would have almost certainly made the NCAA field; wording changed to avoid confusion).

Since expanding the field to over 60 teams, NC State has been to the tournament 11 times, being eliminated in the first round 3 times and in the second round 4 times.

In the same time period, NC State has only upset their first round opponent twice (2005 against #7 Charlotte and 2006 against #7 California).Â In 2005 we went on to reach the S16; in the following year we were knocked out in the second round.

Now you can say you learned something today.Â Please make sure to check out our headline-dump on today’s game (courtesy of 1.21 Jigawatts), our preview of SDSU (courtesy of BJD95), and just incase you are feeling cynical, feel free to check out my previous article on why it’s reasonable/rationale to not let the ACC officiating thing drop.

If you listen to my Dad (BS ME ’50) you would think Case never lost a game and his teams never committed a turnover so I’ve always had a healthy respect for Coach Case. Norm Sloan was worn down by the combination of a UNC-CH media and a cheapskate AD (Willis Casey) before fleeing for Florida. His book, Confessions of A Coach, is an excellent read. In it he basically says what a mistake it was to leave NC State and that Willis Casey was a way better boss than Bill Arnsparger.

re: Case’s ’46-’47 team — getting to the NIT semifinals would have been a big deal… the NIT was truly an Invitational then, a hard won slot against the best competition…it was not the loser’s bracket it is today…(so says wiki)

Sometimes a coach leaving is a blessing though, and that was the case with Sloan. Luckily, Willis Casey was turned down by Morgan Wooten (really, a high school coach – a mistake MD would make a fews later) and we got Coach V.

Also, in hindsight, it might have been better had V taken the UCLA job after the 1988 season. He would have been at UCLA when Personal Fouls hit, meaning much of the “scandal” would have been focused in LA and not Raleigh. We could have had a search that was going on after being a #3 seed, instead of a search that happened after the V fiasco.

Sloan was definitely worn down by a UNC-DOMINATED media and Willis Casey. Also, Case had that fifteen-game winning streak against UNC and right now is the only N.C. State coach who has a winning record against UNC. (Unfortunately, that winning streak brought in Frank McGuire, who ultimately brought in an assistant by the name of Dean Smith.)

Sloan gets a bit of a short shrift in NCSU lore. Case is a Hall of Fame head coach. Valvano excites a lot of passion, because of how his tenure ended and the subsequent 20 years of futility.

Sloan just rebuilt a sinking program, whose glory days of the late 1940’s and 1950’s were dealt a blow by NCAA sanctions and a point shaving scandal.

I know NCSU fans used to think NCSU should always compete, because we’re NCSU dammit, but I think the past generation of futility in rebuilding our team should let us appreciate the job Sloan did in pulling us, no only from falling down a cliff into ACC irrelevance, but producing arguably the best squads in ACC history.

Gene, you’re exactly right about Stormin Norman. I think his problem was the slow rule adjustment from one team in each conference going to the NCAA tournament to two teams from each conference to eventually four teams. Sloan only took three teams to the tournament (70,74,80), and most people associate his success with the success of David Thompson. Had Sloan had been coaching in today’s era, he would have had more NCAA Tournament appearances, and there would have been less of a bias against State (albeit a tiny one, but smaller). Of course, it should have been five appearances (probation in 73 and we were snubbed in 75 when we lost to UNC in the ACC Tournament Final and Maryland was picked over us because they won the regular season title that year).